Shelby Township combat veteran makes a name for himself through exercise

By Andrew Benoit, For The Macomb Daily

Monday, April 22, 2013

Less than four years ago, Capt. Derick Carver was serving as an Army Ranger with the 82nd Airborne in Afghanistan.

While on patrol his platoon was ambushed by the Taliban and Carver ended up losing his left leg and suffered serious damage to his right thigh. After 47 surgeries and 52 blood transfusions, he survived.

The injury forced him to retire from the Army.

He hadn’t thought about what civilian life would be like.

Carver, 29, thrived in the military. Charismatic and a natural leader, he took right to the military lifestyle and the physical activity.

Despite his new disability, Carver quickly found professional success as he went to work again for the Army, this time as an operations analyst for ground combat vehicle maintenance.

Even though he was doing well in his new career, it wasn’t a life Carver enjoyed.

“There was just zero job satisfaction. I was in a cubicle all day and not interacting with anyone,” he said.

His civilian job simply could not fill the void left by his retirement from the Army.

“If I was never hurt I’d still be in the Army,” he said. “Leaving the Army left an internal void that I could never fill in the civilian world.”

And with that, Carver, of Shelby Township, decided to leave his well-paid job and its stability to open his own Crossfit gym.

Crossfit is something Carver found in 2006 while he was still a student at Eastern Michigan University. The principles of Crossfit, Carver said, are similar to the physical fitness routines he grew to love in the Army.

So without the financial stability he had from his job as an analyst and with one less leg than just about every other coach/trainers out there in the Crossfit world, Carver took that leap of faith and opened his own gym.

The decision to do so, he said, became infinitely easier after a fairly innocent trip down to the Arnold Schwarzenegger Sports Festival in Columbus, Ohio, resulted in Carver becoming a viral sensation. He made the 200 mile trek to Columbus to test himself against able-bodied athletes in the Crossfit competition.

Despite only wanting to push himself in the competition, he ended up becoming the weekend’s biggest story.

A YouTube clip of Carver doing his workout went viral, garnering hundreds of thousands of hits and even attracted the attention of Schwarzenegger himself.

The former California governor and Mr. Universe caught wind of the video and took to his Facebook page to share how inspired he was by Carver’s performance. Schwarzenegger was so inspired that he had his people contacted Carver to setup a meeting and workout session between the two. That meeting is tentatively scheduled for later this spring at Carver’s new gym.

Carver said all the attention he received after that weekend only cemented his decision to leave his current job and shoot for another career he knew he would love.

Carver is now trying to make a career as the owner of a gym as well as a competition athlete. He has already garnered a few sponsors for both his gym and the future competitions he plans to enter. Although he will no doubt end up inspiring more people along the way with his work ethic and never-quit attitude, he said that has never been what it’s about for him.

“I don’t try to motivate people because of my situation. I just go out there and do what I love and people happen to be motivated,” he said.

Derick Carver’s gym, Bayonet Crossfit, is on West Star Road off of Schoenherr between 23 and 24 Mile Roads. For more information, visit his Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/BayonetCrossfit.